Perched
in the front seat of the car, Sara was blabbering: "The sun is so nice.
The sun is my friend. He is hiding behind the clouds. Clouds are white in
color. Sun is yellow. Why is the Sun alone in the sky, Papa? Where are Papa Sun and Mama Sun?"

Pre-occupied
in my own train of thoughts, I said nonchalantly, "They are not
there"

With
a tinge of concern in her voice, she asked, "Papa, Why they are not there?
Where have they gone?"

Without
paying much attention, I replied, "They are just not there".

She
looked at me, knitted her eyebrows and with her tiny hands she tried to turn my
face towards her and with a chocking voice said, “Papa, papa...”

I
realized, I had just shattered her world view. She lives is a world where it is
a trio of everything. There is always a papa, a mama and a baby. If a pigeon or
a sparrow hops on to the balcony, she will ask me where is the papa and the
mama. If a pair of them is there, then she will ask where the baby is. If I
draw a butterfly, she will ask me if that is the papa or the mama. If I say, it
is a papa, and then she will ask me to draw a mama and then a baby butterfly. If
I tell her a story of a baby tiger, she will ask where the papa and the mama
tiger are. Her world is complete only if the 3 of them are there together.
Anyone missing is just not done.

So,
I said, "The papa and mama suns are there. But they are living far far
away. They come only when baby sun calls for them."

Then
her universe was at peace.

Friends,
knowingly or unknowingly, everyone has their own world view. As per Wikipedia,
a world view (or worldview) is the fundamental cognitive orientation of an
individual or society encompassing the entirety of the individual or society's
knowledge and point of view. A world view can include natural philosophy;
fundamental, existential, and normative postulates; or themes, values,
emotions, and ethics.

Have
you ever thought how your world view shapes your thinking and communication? Have
you ever been cognizant of other's world view? Have you wondered how your
world-view is shaped and changed based on new knowledge and new perspectives?
Let me know.

It was a hot summer
night. The rumble of the diesel engine penetrated into the darkness. The passengers
in the jeep were all silent. If you were
travelling with them, up ahead in the distance you could see the flickering fire
line on the hills. You could smell the burnt wood and the smoke and feel the
rustle on the warm air against your face. As the jeep took a U-turn, there was a
quick movement on the road. For a
fleeting second or two, two burning eyes flashed across. Sensing danger, the
driver slammed the brake and the vehicle came to a halt. There, in the middle
of the road, standing in full glory, was a majestic, fully grown, Royal Bengal
Tiger.Now, the above were the words of my grandfather. I was fortunate to hear many
such tiger tales. Yes, tigers are majestic animals. They are revered & respected,
awed & admired and loved & loathed at the same time. They feature
prominently in our mythology, folklore, movies and literature.

However, since the
time of my grandfather, lot of water has flown under the bridge. Lots of
forests have been cut down. Lots of tigers have been killed. The tiger is now
reduced to pixels flashing on the screen. We see them only on the National
Geographic or on forwarded face book posts.

Today, the reality of
tigers is quite sad.

The global population
of wild tigers at the start of the 20th century was more than 100,000. Today, it
is less than 4000. There are only 1500 adult
tigers in the wild in India. World over, there were 9 existing sub-species of
tigers at the beginning of 20th century. But, over the last 50 years, 3 tiger
sub-species have become extinct. The major cause of decimation of tigers is
habitat destruction and poaching. The
situation is alarming. If we do not act now, very soon there will not be a
single tiger left in the wild.

You may be wondering
how it matters to you if the tiger continues to live or gets extinct. Let me
remind you that the tiger is our national animal. It is our pride. This by
itself is reason enough for us to save the tiger. But there is a scientific
reason too. With tigers getting
extinct, the populations of prey species would drastically increase. They would
then ravage the jungles. End of jungles would mean the end of the biggest
suppliers of oxygen and a significant drop in rainfall. As per ecologists a
tiger is an umbrella species. By saving them, we rescue every species under
their ecological umbrella. The presence of tigers in the forest is an indicator
of the well being of the ecosystem. Its extinction is an indication that its
ecosystem is not sufficiently protected, and neither would it exist for long
thereafter; Break down of the eco-system would threaten our own existence.

You may be thinking what
can I do here? Well each of us has a role to play. Please lend a hand
for tiger conservation. You can influence those people that are a part of your
lives. Educate them about this issue. Get them involved. Further, you can help
financially to causes such as Project Tiger. You can help the cause in any way
you can. It can be as small as liking their face book page or subscribing to
the feeds on tiger conservation efforts and increasing the awareness.

My
grandfather had a huge collection of books. Whenever I went to our village, I
would rummage through the book shelves. A particular poem in an old dog-eared
book of poetry had caught my attention.

Tyger!
Tyger! burning bright - In the forests of the night,

What
immortal hand or eye - could frame thy
fearful symmetry

Poet William Blake in
those famous lines asked the tiger whose immortal hands created it. I do not
know if the tiger could answer that back; but today if someone asks whose hand
is responsible for the death of tigers, we all know it is ours – the humans. A stitch in time
saves nine. The same hand can save the tiger as well. Let us join our hands and
with our collective effort, try to save the tiger. Let us save the beautiful symmetry.

My first love for books and
stories started may be when I was 2 or 3 when my mother used to read me stories
from Odia magazines - Manapabana and Shishu Raija. Apparently, I used to memorize those stories
and pretended to read them aloud while holding the magazine upside down. Slowly
Janhamamu became a regular feature at our house. Then came those hard bound Russian books for
children that were available in India in late 70s early 80s. When I started
reading myself, I discovered the joys of Chandamama and later, Champak, Tinkle
and Target. At the same time I was introduced to the world inhabited by the superheroes
of our time - My favorites were Phantom - The Ghost who walks (Indrajal comics)
, followed by Superman (Dalton Comics) , Robin and the elusive Batman and
Spiderman. Batman and Spiderman comics were not in much supply. Then there were
Indian superheroes like Bahadur and Chacha Chowdhury. Moving on I devoured the
Famous Five and Nancy Drew series and before I knew it, I was hooked on to
proper books. Our very own Ruskin Bond
had a prime place. Later it was the Russians like Turgenev and Dostoevsky and
Indian stalwarts like Mulk Raj Anand and RK Narayan that kept me awake at
night.

Apart from novels and storybooks,
when I was in school, I also loved poems. I enjoyed reading them; memorized
them by heart and cherished them. I also liked writing - short stories, small
articles on general interest, and even tried my hand at poems. I wanted to
study Literature. I wanted to become a writer, a poet, an author. But I knew
there was no job for a poet. There were many authors walking around with a
jhola. In my small circle of friends, no
one really appreciated a poet. No one appreciated reading literature. No one
appreciated the finer facets in life. Maths was considered macho and Science
was supposed to be super cool. Arts was for the duds who could not stand up to
the fury of science.

But my choice between Arts and
Science was not based on those idiotic opinions. It was a pragmatic decision.
If I studied Arts and pursued my passion, I felt it would be a lot tough to
earn a living. So, when the time arrived to take a decision, I ditched my
passion. I took up science after 10th. I just took the easy way out. In India in the early 90s, when
the windows of liberalization were opening up, my outlook was limited to just 2
career choices for any science student pursuing +2.Those were: Either Medical or Engineering.
And, there were just 3 medical colleges in my state and 5 engineering colleges.
You had to crack the Joint Entrance Exam to get through either. It was not like
how it is now, that everyone who appears the exam gets a rank and can take
admission in one of the hundreds of engineering colleges in each state. Back
then, cracking the entrance was a make or break turning point in life for most
of us. There again, competition for Medical was even tougher than that for
engineering. Getting into Medical college was real difficult. So, I made my choice.
I choose the path of least resistance and took the easy way out. I went for
Engineering, the easier between the 2 difficult choices.

Have you ever thought why you
choose what you chose? What were the considerations and how has life been
different because of those choices? Though life has not been bad
because of the choices that I made, I sometimes wonder how life would have been
if I would have taken the road less traveled. What struggles would I have
faced and how I would have been molded because of them. I am sure, even after
25 years, most of the things remains the same. Most of us just take the easy
way out. We do not go after what really interests us. We just go with the herd
mentality and do what others do. Going after passion is difficult. Going after
passion is the hard way. Going after passion is fulfilling. But foregoing our
passions and taking the easy way out is what most of us do, inadvertently. And
that becomes the road not traveled. Given a choice, where would you go?

Meeting # 152: Elan Toastmasters was special in many ways. The
meeting was a heady cocktail of masterful emceeing, sterling speeches and
dazzling evaluations.

SAA TM Braja opened the meeting and President TM Sudha welcomed
the guests. Then, DTM Alfred, the Toastmaster of the day, had the ball rolling
with the theme as Football World cup. We were treated to interesting tidbits
about football, how a football team can be compared with a toastmaster club and
how important team work is in both cases.

Then TM Manish spoke about the 10 heads - The five that
criticize him and the 5 that enthuse him in all his endeavors. Vocal variety
was at its best display. Each of the heads was represented by a character that
spoke in its own style. I would say, TM Manish really hit the nail in the head
by telling us that we should silence all our critics and just get it done.

The TM Padma told a priceless story about a salesman. He completely
engaged the audience by painting a picture of the scene and with the right mix
of emotions, gestures and flawless delivery, he mesmerized us. We understood
what the basic ingredients are to become a successful sales man.

We then had some interesting games organized by Alfred which was
quite innovative and had the audience rolling on the floor laughing.

This was followed with a good table topics session led by TM
Pranay.

The evaluation were as superb as the speeches. Both the
evaluators TM Naqi and TM Shashank were spot on with their analysis and
provided specific and helpful suggestions. Thanks to the GE TM Vijay and all
other role players TM Sharath, TM Sreekanth, TM Braja, TM Aravind and TM Veera
for taking up the roles.

We also witnessed a change of guard, wherein the ex President
conducted the installation ceremony for the new EC.The new president TM Sudha
gave the presidential address and all members took oath to serve and support
the club and its members.

This meeting was unique in at least 3 ways:

This
was a meeting where in one TM won 3 ribbons. TM Naqi won the Best Table
Topics Speaker, Best Evaluator and Best Listener award.

In
this meeting there were 4 speakers who did not have a single filler word:
TM Naqi, TM Manish, TM Padma and TM Sudha.

Live.Love.Laugh.Learn

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About Me

You: "Well...Sorry, I could'nt get it. Can you please tell that again?"

Me: Never mind! To cut a long name short, I am Braja. Trust that is better. I live in Hyderabad, India with my wife and daughter. I am passionate about reading, writing, running and lately toastmastering... I blog about general musings and random thoughts. I try to live my life well, with lots of love and laugh, learning small new things everyday and finally leave the world a little better.

In another avatar, I work with Capgemini. You can find my professional credentials here.